Gurli Benou

When the ocean liner M/S Giulio Cesare arrived in New York harbor in May 1959, Gurli Benou disembarked with four pieces of luggage and her new husband at her side. After a three-month courtship in Rome, she had cast her fortune with a stateless person. What others might regard as a reckless gamble was in fact the most self-assured decision of Gurli’s life. Together, Robert and Gurli began their adventure in America, creating a world of family and new friends, thereby defining for themselves what a life well-lived would be.

Gurli was born in the port city of Hanko, Finland in 1935.  Some of her earliest childhood memories were of the Winter War: the distinctive sound of Soviet bombers laboring under the weight of their payloads; the danger of wearing a brightly colored jacket on a snow-covered playground lest she stand out as a target for strafing Russian planes; her mother counting the silver at the local yacht club she managed before boarding the last train to Helsinki as Russian warships steamed into the harbor behind her. 

Thus displaced with her Swedish-speaking mother, Gurli entered a school system in which instruction was in Finnish, a language she had never learned.  In addition to Swedish and Finnish, she became fluent in Italian and English and conversant in Russian, working in international hospitality for Shell Oil.  When her mother married renowned Finnish musician Olavi Lampinen, Gurli came to know the music of the age.  Through her beloved stepfather, lead trombonist for the Helsinki Radio Symphony orchestra, she became acquainted with the great composer Sibelius and met Louis Armstrong when he came to Finland to perform.

Gurli had recently arrived in Rome on holiday when she met Robert Benou, a dashing Egyptian exile who was renting the room across the hall from hers.  Thus began a love story that would last for six decades.  Following a whirlwind romance in Italy and an exchange of wedding vows in the tiny mountaintop Republic of San Marino, Robert and Gurli boarded a ship to the United States and rented an apartment in Newark, New Jersey.  With two young daughters, they then moved to a modest home in Fanwood, and later to Westfield.  After the birth of their son, they came to Mountainside and ultimately to the house they built on Hillside Avenue.  As Robert developed his business, Gurli created their home, reflecting their distinctive notion of hospitality within a space of elegance, grace, and comfort. 

Throughout their life together, Robert and Gurli travelled frequently to destinations around the world, always in timeless style.  Robert would whisk Gurli off on Concorde to London or Paris, sometimes with as little as a day’s notice.  Emblematic of their adventures was the time when Gurli traversed the rugged hillside terrain of the ancient Persian ruins of Isfahan, dressed impeccably in a white skirt and heels.  They claimed Nassau as their second home, returning to the Bahamas two or three times per year with their family and friends.  In New Jersey, Gurli and Robert created a treasured group of lifelong friends who gathered every year for the renowned Benou Christmas party. Gurli was active in local clubs and co-founded the Friends of the Morris Museum, helping produce exhibits of local artists, including close friends Harry Devlin and Julian Rockmore.

After 59 years of marriage, Robert passed in 2017.  For the last chapter of her life, Gurli was surrounded by her children, grandchildren, and her Cavalier King Charles Spaniel, Katie.  Gurli passed quietly at home on November 28, 2021, her hand held unceasingly by the people she loved and who loved her.  As Gurli said many times, she lived a full life and wanted for nothing except her husband, whom she “loved madly.” Robert and Gurli are now dancing together to Cole Porter’s “Begin the Beguine” underneath the Zebra tree.

Gurli is survived by her three children, Dina Stellwagen, Denise Benou Stires, and Marc Benou, and her five grandchildren, Morgan, Campbelle, Hunter, Caroline, and Elizabeth.  A celebration of her life will be held in Spring 2022.

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